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Indoor range

2K views 11 replies 10 participants last post by  Alacrity 
#1 ·
I belong to a club which is a indoor shooting range. It’s only 50’ but it’s perfect for pistol shooting. My question is what drills can you recommend for indoor ranges which won’t allow you to draw from a holster and no closer than 7 yards. I want to improve my skills instead of just making holes in paper.
 
#2 ·
I’m pretty much in the same situation. Our indoor private indoor range is also 50’ and no drawing from the holster or really rapid fire. As all summer long I shoot at a different outdoor range that allows drawing from the holster and shooting steel and IDPA targets (bring your own), I am able to do all my defensive practice. So during the winter I tend to focus on precision shooting and shoot a lot of one hand bullseye, both right and left hand. I really only shoot at 50’ and also shoot two handed but still with an emphasis on precision. This seems to help me out during the summer with fast defensive drills as I’m used to shooting at a 3” bullseye all winter from 50’ and so an 8” circle on an IDPA target at 10 yards kinda looks huge. With the one hand bullseye I’ll concentrate on slow trigger pulls but also do some quick pulls both one and two hand while trying not to move the gun at all. As Rob Leatham says or at least I’ll try to paraphrase, it is okay to jerk the trigger and it is needed to shoot really fast, but you can’t move the gun when doing so.

Practicing precision at longer ranges will translate to better fast shooting at closer distances in the summer. I think it is all about basic fundamentals getting to be second nature.

I do practice draws at home during the winter but not as much as I should.
 
#3 · (Edited)
There are drills that are geared for indoor ranges. Google indoor range drills and you can see there are quite a few (too many to list here). I just bought some hi-viz targets from Amazon, full size target paper with 8 - 5" bulls eyes (about $25 for 25 targets). I came up with some fun competition with a friend (each our own target and lane). Target was @ 7 yards, start with pistol on bench (or low ready if no bench) with 2 - 8 round magazines, one is loaded into the pistol. At the start, we did 8 shots strong side supported, then reload and 8 shots weak side supported. Then reload 2 - 8 round mags and repeat the drill but unsupported (one handed strong and weak handed). For us accuracy was the determining factor in who "won". I'm sure there may be a name for this drill, or a variation there of but it was more interesting than just running a target out and punching some holes.

Not sure I can post a link to the targets but they are either red or blue bulls on 19x25 white paper. I left a review with the above drill too. I may include this training at our next monthly team shoot that I run.
 
#4 · (Edited)
Do you have access to NRA B-27 targets?

I ran a Practical Pistol League for 10 years and have dozens of skill building stages that are really drills that can be repeated for practice.

I can send some to you or post them here.

Smiles,
 
#6 · (Edited)
You should be able to do pretty much any SD drill from the ready (if they will not allow you to draw and fire)...There are many drills you can do at 7y-50' (your constraints) even if you are limited to 1 target (I take it). Google FAST-drill, 6 rounds one target. Mozambique drill. Bill drill. Etc....And make up your own drills mixing shooting at different parts of the target (head, vs CM, vs hip, etc). The combination's are endless. Also the dot-torture drill is a great one (the target with 10 small circles on it). Etc, etc...It comes down to exercising the speed vs accuracy trade-off for various situation's, target sizes, and distances, along with manipulating your firearm per the manual of arms (especially including reloads). The more you can "exercise" these variable when training, the more productive a shoot you will have...With this in mind, be creative about choosing and even designing your own drill's, have fun with it!
 
#8 ·
Using a shot timer, set the par time for 1 second.

Place an NRA B8 target at 5-15 yards.

Fire 1 shot from ready into the target within the 1 second par time.

Repeat this 10 times. Score the rings.

A score of 90 or above is a pass, push the target out to the next distance.

This is easy to practice at home in dry fire as well.
 
#9 ·
Unfortunately pubic ranges, both indoor and outdoor tend to be very strict and won't allow draws from holster, rapid fire or shooting at multiple targets at once. Given the number of ignorant or careless bozos who often show up to shoot I guess I really can't blame them. If you don't have the ability to shoot somewhere out in the woods I suggest setting up a "training bay" at home and use realistic Airsoft or BB guns.
 
#10 ·
If you are in my state Blackwing allows draws and transitions and if you are the only one in the bay you can kills the lights too.
 
#11 ·
At my range we have idiots who occasionally kill the lights too... unintentionally. The first time I went there was literally three days after they first opened for business, and already there were a couple holes in the ceiling baffles and one graze mark on the side wall. I'm sure anyone who works at a range could tell lots of horror stories and justify why the rules are often so strict.
 
#12 ·
I'm sure anyone who works at a range could tell lots of horror stories and justify why the rules are often so strict.
I was out at a range two weeks ago. I live in Chicago and this is the closest range to the south side of Chicago so you get a lot of Homies with hardware they have no idea how to use.

One guy had a brand new pistol grip shotgun. I was curious how they handle since I like the compactness of them.

Guy put the target out about 5-7 yards. He fires the first shot and the paper doesn't even move. Second shot, same thing, but I notice a lot of dust. In the third through fifth shot I saw what he was doing. He was blowing holes in the ceiling. He would fire and sparks would go off and about a square foot of ceiling would come down.

Same day out two people were sharing a lane. One would empty his clip while the other on took a few steps back and loaded his gun. Yep each guy was loading his gun with the barrel pointed at the other guys back.

Just Saturday one kid was holding his gun gangster style two lanes over. It was hilarious because the brass kept ejecting straight into his face. He couldnt hit his target worth a damn. When I retrieved my target I notices that there were three holes in the target that were not from my gun. Guy was hitting the target two lanes to the right.

Evidently the safest place when Homie is shooting a gun is right in front of him.
 
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